


Unmoored

by Minutia_R



Category: The Chronicles of Chrestomanci - Diana Wynne Jones
Genre: Bittersweet, M/M, Pre-Canon
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-12-17
Updated: 2014-12-17
Packaged: 2018-03-01 22:46:01
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 5,037
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/2790464
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Minutia_R/pseuds/Minutia_R
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>
  <i>He had always thought he would end up married to his work.  He had studied hard, worked diligently, brought himself to the attention of the right people--and ended up with an appointment to the Chrestomanci’s personal staff, as high as one could rise in Flavian’s chosen profession if one hadn’t happened to be born with nine lives.  And when he got there he’d found Mordecai waiting for him.  Mordecai, who threw all his previous ideas into confusion.</i>
</p>
            </blockquote>





	Unmoored

**Author's Note:**

  * For [iphianassa](https://archiveofourown.org/users/iphianassa/gifts).



“That will be all, Flavian,” said the Chrestomanci--Monsignor DeWitt-- _Gabriel_ , Flavian reminded himself. He was supposed to call him Gabriel.

“Thank you--sir,” said Flavian, his nerve failing him at the last moment. Gabriel nodded, brisk and impatient, but didn’t correct Flavian’s form of address. _Sir_ , it seemed, was acceptable. Chrestomanci’s department wasn’t all on a first-name basis with each other because they were all such bosom friends; it was only that they were too busy with pressing matters to bother with fripperies like titles. And far too busy to reassure the newest wet-behind-the-ears recruit, or listen to stammering speeches about what an honor it was to work for the Chrestomanci, and how he would do everything in his power to prove himself worthy of the trust that had been placed in him--

Right. Pressing matters. He was to ask Miss Rosalie for the Eliphas file; he was to familiarize himself with its contents; he was to find Mordecai Roberts and render him all assistance. Flavian knew nothing about the Eliphas affair besides the few vague but lurid details that had made it into the broadsheets, and even less about Mordecai Roberts, but he knew Miss Rosalie, at least. When he’d arrived for his interview, she’d waved him into Gabriel’s office without looking up from her typewriter, and she was still tapping away when he came back.

Flavian cleared his throat. “Rosalie? The Ch--er--Gabriel told me to ask you for the Eliphas file.”

“Oh! Has he taken you on, then?” She finished typing her sentence, returned the carriage of the typewriter with a smart _ding!_ and stood up, extending her hand. Flavian took it. Her handshake wasn’t what Flavian would have expected from a woman; it was firm, no-nonsense, and brief. “I’m sure it will be a pleasure working with you,” she added, but from the set of her mouth Flavian wondered if she even knew what the word meant.

He tried to squash the unkind thought. She took her job seriously, that was all. And so should he take his. She pulled on a pair of lace mittens before starting to rummage around in the tall file cabinets that lined the walls, and finally handed a Flavian a thick folder from which several loose sheets were trying to escape.

“The Eliphas file,” she said. “Have you been assigned rooms yet? If not, you can take that down to the library to read.”

“Thank you,” said Flavian, and backed out of the office before it occurred to him that he had no idea where the library was. He wandered around for several minutes, increasingly desperate, until a passing footman took pity on him and pointed him in the right direction.

The library at Chrestomanci Castle was amazing. It was a wrench to find himself a nice quiet corner to read in rather than go browsing through the stacks, but once he got fairly started on the file the temptation to do anything else vanished. He found himself absorbed in the details of the case, in the blind alleys of investigation the detectives had been led down, in the subtle clues and flashes of insight that had led them to the correct solution at last, in the description of the tense standoff that had led finally to the criminals’ arrest.

He began, too, to get a picture of Mordecai Roberts, whom he was supposed to render all assistance. Thanks to Mordecai’s unparallelled spirit-traveling abilities, he’d been able to tail the criminals to the most inaccessible places, and he seemed to think in right angles to other people, realizing the significance in clues they’d overlooked. In the final confrontation, he’d been fearless. There was a terse note from a Dr. Simonson about his _flagrant disregard for personal safety_ that was clearly meant to be condemnatory, but it fired Flavian’s imagination. He pictured a steely-eyed veteran, his wits sharpened and magic toughened by years of occult investigations, taciturn and serious-minded as he’d come to expect from the people at the castle. Someone he could learn from.

What he found--when a chatty maid took him by the elbow and led him to Mordecai’s office--was a man no older than himself, with bright eyes in a dark face, and a froth of pale curls.

“The Eliphas affair?” he said, when Flavian had explained his errand. “Not much left to do there. Well, maybe Gabriel will give you something more interesting once you’ve--” the corner of his mouth quirked up, and the corners of his eyes crinkled with it; it was fascinating-- “proven yourself. For now, have you got the map of the house?”

Flavian found it in the file, and Mordecai laid it on his desk and began marking it up with quick, breezy x’s. Flavian watched him write; he tried to keep his eyes on the plan of the house, but they kept slipping back to Mordecai’s fingers instead. “The police have secured the house,” said Mordecai, “but they haven’t been able to find all the stolen jewels that should be there. They may be hidden behind Don’t Notices or magical traps. Someone’s got to go there and disable them--think you can handle it?”

Flavian nodded. Amid all the strangeness of Chrestomanci Castle, here was something he knew. “It shouldn’t be a problem,” he said.

“Excellent.” Mordecai flashed a brilliant smile. Flavian forgot to breathe for a few seconds. “And Flavian--welcome to Chrestomanci’s department.”

Flavian somehow found his way to the pentagram in a sort of fog. It wasn’t until after he had located all of the missing jewels, and stood shaking hands with a knot of policemen in the stripped-down parlor of the criminals’ den that he realized: Mordecai was the only person all day who’d smiled at him.

#

Mordecai was right--once Flavian had proven himself, Gabriel did give him more interesting work. There were times--like when he was playing a deadly game of hide-and-seek in a railway tunnel with a nest of sorcerous Prussian spies--that he wished he’d been stuck with routine cleanup after other peoples’ operations a little bit longer. But mostly he didn’t. He was, as it turned out, quite good at his job. Soon he was moving among the competent, professional staff of Chrestomanci Castle, if not exactly comfortably, then at least less like he was afraid someone would pull off his mask and expose him for the fraud he was any minute.

With Mordecai, though--working with Mordecai was different. Then, Flavian didn’t have to be all too aware of himself; of his voice being too loud and his gestures too wide, of staring in slack-jawed wonder at things that were routine for anyone who’d served on Gabriel’s staff for a while. He was all too aware of Mordecai instead. The creases at the sides of his mouth. The easy set of his shoulders when he leaned across a desk to talk to someone behind it. The way he lowered his voice, confidingly, inviting whoever he was speaking to to move just a little closer . . . 

It was hardly the first time Flavian had taken a fancy to a fellow. At school, and then at university, there were always other students with whom sharing work and play had led to sharing other things--experimental kisses behind the equipment shed, or when he got a bit older, awkward fumbling in beds in shared dormitories, trying to stay quiet enough that they could pretend they weren’t being overheard. But that wasn’t serious. It was--it had always been understood--for comradeship, for simple animal pleasure, because a fellow had to occupy himself somehow when there were no girls around.

Except Flavian had never been one for girls. He had known it ever since he had been a small boy, peeping from behind his mother’s skirt at the couples dancing on the village green at harvest time. Neither could he picture himself as one of those bachelor uncles one hears about, sitting contented at a fireside not his own, doting on and spoiling his nephews and nieces. He had a sister back in Lindsey Wash with five children, and he saw them when he went home for Christmas or Mothering Sunday; he liked them well enough, and that was as far as it went.

He’d always thought he would end up married to his work. He had studied hard, worked diligently, brought himself to the attention of the right people--and ended up with an appointment to the Chrestomanci’s personal staff, as high as one could rise in Flavian’s chosen profession if one hadn’t happened to be born with nine lives. And when he got there he’d found Mordecai waiting for him. Mordecai, who threw all his previous ideas into confusion.

In school, Flavian had become rather adept at figuring out which of the other boys were interested in that sort of thing. A wrong guess could have, on occasion, very bad consequences. But Mordecai, for all his seeming openness, his fluent friendly chatter, his infectious laughter--Mordecai was very hard to read. And Flavian wanted him more than he had ever wanted anything.

So he took his chance, or he made it, one night when it was just himself and Mordecai, burning the midnight oil in the library, finishing up a report on a band of smugglers they’d arrested the previous day. Flavian hadn’t wanted to close the case. The smugglers had been better informed, better equipped, than petty criminals should have been, and he couldn’t shake the feeling that they’d only caught the small fry in their net, and let the bigger fish slip through.

“You’ve got your metaphors backwards, Flavian,” said Mordecai with a grin. He wove his fingers together and held them up. “You see, the way a net works is that the big fish get caught, while the little ones can--”

“Enough.” Flavian shook his head, though he couldn’t help laughing at Mordecai’s whimsy, even if it was at his expense. “I’ll sign the blasted report, all right?”

“You might as well sign it; you wrote it,” said Mordecai. Writing wasn’t one of his strong suits. “And you don’t really believe in the Wraith, do you?”

“A mysterious individual whom no-one’s ever seen, but who commands powers we’re only beginning to understand?” Flavian asked. “There’ve been days when we’ve arrested six of those before breakfast.”

“A fair point. But until we see concrete evidence of the Wraith’s existence, I’m afraid I’m going to continue to consider him the sort of bogeyman that mothers frighten their children with so they’ll stay tucked up in their beds at night.” Mordecai signed the report with a flourish and passed it along to Flavian. “Speaking of beds, I’m for mine, as soon as this is out of the way. If you’d be so kind?”

Flavian added his own signature, and stood up. Mordecai did too, at the same time; he was standing so close, and he was sleepy-eyed, and smelled of fresh linen and soap. And Flavian put a hand on his waist and said, “And do you need help being tucked up into bed as well?”

Mordecai laughed like Flavian had scored another conversational point. Then he pulled Flavian closer and combed his fingers through Flavian’s hair. “I wouldn’t say no.”

Mordecai’s touch was feather-light, and so was his voice. _Lighter than air_ , Flavian thought dizzily, and pictured himself as a balloon, floating free of the earth. He was suddenly, irrelevantly, reminded of a joke his sister had told, last time he’d been home.

_What do you call a man from the Fens who’s gone to work in the big city?_ Urania had said.

Flavian had replied, _I don’t know; what?_

_Unmoored._

And Flavian was.

#

Flavian’s world had shrunk to this: a glint along the edge of a knife, the dimple it made in the flesh of a throat, and a quiet, despairing wail at the back of his mind wondering how it had all gone wrong.

The knife belonged to Lucinda Stock, Countess of Hagsmere and Fort Crag, who until a few days before had hosted one of the most fashionable literary salons in London. The throat belonged to her nephew, the son of the Foreign Minister--which explained both how the boy had come to be in that predicament, and how Chrestomanci’s department had become involved so quickly in what had at first appeared to be a simple case of a child giving his tutors the slip and wandering off.

He was about the same age as Flavian’s second-youngest nephew, who was always showing off his beetle collection. Which might have explained why Flavian, who was supposed to be doing the talking, was having trouble getting the words out.

“I want passage to another world,” the countess snarled. She faced Flavian across the roof of her townhouse, holding the boy in front of her like a shield. Her hair and dress were blowing wildly in the wind, but she had a grip like iron and absolutely steady hands. “A safe world, a _nice_ world, and no one is to follow me. And I’ll need gold--” She paused for a moment, maybe to consider how much gold to demand. Flavian forced himself to speak into the silence, and hoped he sounded mild and reasonable rather than terrified.

“We can get you that.” He held his hands open, slightly out to the sides, empty. But empty hands didn’t mean he was helpless, and the countess knew that. He had never counted it a disadvantage before; now, for the first time, he wished he had some way to convincingly appear not to be a threat. “We can get you all that, but you must know we’re the only ones who can. So you’ve got to deal with us--with me. I’ve got no objection to seeing the back of you, and no interest in hurting you, but I absolutely need a guarantee the boy will be safe.”

Where was Mordecai? There was a limit to how long Flavian could keep stalling this madwoman. Already she was looking through Flavian, not hearing him, hearing only the echoes of her own mind, and steeling herself, Flavian feared, for some desperate, final action.

“Guarantee! You’ll give me everything, and you’ll do it now, or you can tell my precious brother-in-law how you--”

_There_ was Mordecai, slipping up behind the countess from between the chimney and a gable, where Flavian knew--and so would she--that there was no passage. But something must have showed in Flavian’s face, or else the countess was just that twitchily aware of her surroundings. She gave a start; her hands tightened convulsively--and for a moment her mind wasn’t on her knife, and in that moment Flavian conjured it from her hand into his.

He had reckoned without the second knife in her sleeve. It flashed, and between one breath and the next the boy would be dead--Flavian dropped the knife and dove for him, wrapped his arms around the small body as they tumbled over and over down the steep slope of the roof. The countess’ knife fell again, towards the only target within easy reach. Mordecai staggered back and gave a choked-off cry, his chest suddenly bright with blood--it was really him up there, not his spirit form. Flavian’s feet couldn’t find purchase on the tiles. It was a long fast fall to the street below, with no time to set up a steady translocate. Flavian pictured the pentagram in the castle and mentally launched himself towards it, landing with a jolt that rattled all his teeth. The boy in his arms started sobbing.

“It’s all right,” said Flavian distractedly. “You’re safe now.”

Which he supposed the boy already knew, on some level. He hadn’t made a sound the whole time on the roof. But Flavian didn’t have any better comfort to offer. He kept hearing Mordecai’s cry, seeing him clutch his chest, the blood seeping between his fingers. _Flagrant disregard for personal safety_ \--it didn’t seem as charming now as it had before Flavian had met Mordecai, before they had become . . . lovers, Flavian supposed was the word.

Except it had never been a question of love, with him and Mordecai. It was--it had always been understood--companionship, and simple animal pleasure, and there was certainly that, but--

It had been understood that Mordecai was a specialist, an investigator and a spirit-traveler. He couldn’t conjure or translocate or do half the things that Flavian did, so he’d had no business being up there on the roof, in person.

Flavian delivered the boy to Gabriel’s office, where his parents were waiting. They tried to express their boundless gratitude towards Flavian, and they were very much the right sort of people to come to the attention to, but Flavian just had one thing to say, and that was to Gabriel.

“Mordecai?”

“In Dr. Simonson’s surgery,” said Gabriel. “You’ll be glad to hear that he brought the Countess of Hagsmere and Fort Crag in successfully.”

As it happened, Gabriel was as wrong as Flavian had ever known him to be. Flavian hadn’t been lying when he’d told the countess that he’d have no objection at all to seeing the back of her.

It was several hours’ wait before Flavian was allowed to see Mordecai. Flavian’s anger, always slow to kindle, had a good long while to simmer. The sight of Mordecai propped up against a mountain of pillows, gray-faced and smiling a pale, watery reflection of his usual grin, was far too late to disarm it.

“What were you thinking, Mordecai?”

Mordecai tilted his head back and closed his eyes. “Don’t shout at me, Flavian, I’ve got a headache. And it worked, didn’t it?”

“It’s not what I would call working,” said Flavian. “Getting yourself stabbed and concussed and God knows what else. Who do you think you are, Gabriel? You’ve only got the one life!”

“True. But it’s a little harder to get at than most people’s. As you’ve seen.” He waved a dismissive hand, as if it didn’t matter much, when it was the most important thing in the world to Flavian. “Honestly, I don’t understand what you’re so upset about.”

Flavian didn’t know what to say. The worst part was, Mordecai was probably telling the truth.

#

When he was six years old, Flavian had used his witch sight for the first time. He’d been sitting in church, bored half to death, wondering how Urania managed to keep her attention fixed so devotedly on her hymn-book--and then he’d seen that it wasn’t a hymn-book at all, but an illustrated penny-ballad she’d cast a clever little glamour over.

Once he’d known how to see, he couldn’t stop seeing--the illusions dandies used to make an old suit of clothes seem just a bit sharper, the Don’t Notices lurking in dusty corners of stately homes, all sorts of things he’d never been aware of and suddenly couldn’t ignore.

This was like that. He noticed, now, how rooms went a little darker when Mordecai left them, how when he was working on a case without Mordecai he found himself saving up little tidbits to tell him later. Not clues that Flavian might need another opinion on; just things he thought might make Mordecai laugh.

Flavian loved to listen to Mordecai laugh. But there was an edge of hurt to it now that there hadn’t been before. It wasn’t fair to blame Mordecai for being the way he was, especially since that was half of what had attracted Flavian to him in the first place, that he didn’t take everything so deadly seriously as everyone else in Chrestomanci Castle. It was only that Flavian wished for some sign that Mordecai took _him_ more seriously than the wink he gave whichever maid came in with the tea trolley during a boring meeting. And there wasn’t any.

A few times, when they were working together, Flavian had seen Mordecai go into a trance. The other medium would play music for him--often it was Rosalie with her harp--and Mordecai would lie back and close his eyes. And then there would be a moment when his body took on a deeper stillness than sleep, an unnerving vacancy, and Flavian would know his spirit had gone travelling.

Now, with his keener vision, Flavian suspected that Mordecai was in some way like that all the time; his body present, his spirit elusive. He visited Mordecai’s rooms more often, after dark or before dawn. He dragged him off into odd corners at odd hours with a desperate urgency, hungry not just for his hands and his mouth and the weight of his body--though there was certainly that--but for something that as much as he chased he could never quite catch.

One night, a couple of weeks after the countess’ arrest, Flavian was half-dozing in his bed, one arm thrown over Mordecai, when Mordecai made to get up. “Stay,” Flavian mumbled, tightening his arm.

Mordecai shrugged and settled back into the mattress and said, “If you like.”

Flavian would almost rather Mordecai had refused than agreeing like that, like he was humoring Flavian; Flavian wasn’t finding much humor in the situation lately. But it felt very good to fall asleep with Mordecai next to him.

Some time in the middle of the night, Mordecai squeezed Flavian’s shoulder and whispered, “Duty calls.”

In the morning Flavian woke up to find him gone. And what sort of duty would know to look for Mordecai in Flavian’s bed? Mordecai never mentioned it again, nor did Gabriel or anyone else. Flavian wasn’t entirely sure he hadn’t dreamed it.

When Flavian was small, confused and overwhelmed by the differences between what he saw and what he was supposed to see, between what people said and what they did, he took to going on long, solitary rambles. They cleared his mind; the trees and rocks and streams were never anything but what they were. The grounds at the castle weren’t as extensive as the moors back home, but they were wide enough. And Mordecai seldom interrupted him there. Mordecai was one for new and exciting places, for cities and crowds.

But Flavian would know his soft tread anywhere, on pavement or leaf mould or mud. He turned back and waved to the figure coming up the path, and-- _damn it_ \--the forest was suddenly a little brighter, the day a little warmer.

“What brings you here?” said Flavian.

Mordecai shrugged. “Dr. Simonson said I should take some exercise. Apparently I’m still convalescing.”

And not that he was looking for Flavian. Mordecai never sought out Flavian, only the other way around.

“Won't you give me a smile?” said Mordecai into Flavian’s brooding silence. "You're so lovely when you do."

“You say that to Rosalie, too,” Flavian pointed out. "When you mean _please don't tell Gabriel I've misplaced his Lamp of Wonders again_."

Mordecai raised his eyebrows. “Well, Rosalie is lovely. But it never works. Aren’t you in a mood lately?” He twitched aside Flavian’s collar and buried his face in his neck. “Shall I kiss it better?”

Flavian’s arms went around Mordecai without consulting his brain. He closed his eyes with a sigh. It would be so easy to say yes, or not to say anything, to melt into Mordecai’s kisses and forget everything else--but the easy way was Mordecai’s way, always, and Flavian had had his fill of it. He let go, stepped away, left Mordecai blinking in surprise.

“Wheedling extra tea cakes out of Erica--as if you were ten years old--works perfectly well, though,” said Flavian. “And that new footman, Gilbert, the way he looks at you--he’ll be getting your name tattooed on his arm soon, but I don’t expect you’ve noticed.”

“Isn’t he the one with all the freckles?” The corners of Mordecai’s mouth twitched. “They _are_ rather fetching.”

“Do you think it’s funny? I suppose I am jealous, and I suppose I am ridiculous, but it’s not just that. You’re still not recovered, and you’re going on midnight missions and you won’t tell me what it’s about--you were almost killed and you expect me to act like nothing happened--is it because that’s how you’d feel, if it had been me? You’d shrug and write your report and go on with your life?”

“Well, of course I--” Mordecai started, but Flavian kept on talking over him.

“Didn’t it mean anything to you?” he said. “Don’t I?”

“Flavian,” said Mordecai. He wasn’t laughing anymore, but he had a look on his face--like he was seeing for the first time, and what he saw appalled him. Flavian turned away. “Flavian, I didn’t think--I didn’t mean--”

“I know,” said Flavian. “But I did. I meant all of it. And I can’t do it anymore, Mordecai.”

He walked off down the path, resolutely not paying attention to whether Mordecai was following--he didn’t think he could stand it if he was, and he didn’t think he could stand it if he wasn’t. The trees and the rocks and the streams weren’t anything but what they were, but Flavian hardly saw them, and they did nothing to ease his mind. It was dark before he made it back to the castle.

#

The next day, when Flavian went to fetch a file from Rosalie, he saw a vase of red roses perched awkwardly on top of one of her cabinets.

“Have you got an admirer?” Flavian asked.

Rosalie gave a delicate snort. “It’s just Mordecai.”

Rosalie clearly knew how to take Mordecai. Flavian never had. The trouble was, he didn’t know how to leave him alone, either. When they were in the same room, he didn’t know where to look; when they had to speak, his words half-strangled him.

So he kept his head down and he worked. It was what he knew how to do; it was what he had always done, before Mordecai. And maybe no one else saw any change in him. He was young, keen Flavian Temple, diligent and earnest and a little shy. But he took no joy in his work anymore. If this was a marriage, he could see nothing but long loveless years of it stretching out in front of him.

Mordecai, on the other hand, was cheerful and good-natured, flirting more outrageously than ever with the maids and footmen, with Rosalie and even with Frederick Parkinson and Dr. Simonson, to Frederick’s uncomfortable bafflement and Dr. Simonson’s complete indifference.

With Flavian he was, very carefully, friendly and polite. And Flavian knew that all he’d have to do was apologize--not even that. A touch, a smile, any indication that he wanted things back the the way they’d been, and Mordecai would be willing to laugh off their quarrel like it had never happened. Forgiveness was doubtless as easy for Mordecai as everything else.

And he did want them back. He wanted Mordecai. He missed him like he missed air, when he took a hill too fast and suddenly found himself unable to get his next breath. And it was only his own stubbornness that was keeping them apart, but he couldn’t let go of it.

#

Flavian heard when Mordecai quarreled with Rosalie. The whole castle heard. It was a stupid, _stupid_ thing to be jealous of, and still--Mordecai hadn’t bothered shouting back at Flavian.

But there was also a certain savage satisfaction in it. If Mordecai had come to care about anything, about anyone, enough to let himself get angry--good. Maybe he would finally understand how Flavian felt.

So it wasn’t a complete surprise when Mordecai came knocking on the door of Flavian’s study later that evening. It was only Flavian’s own reaction that surprised him. One look at Mordecai and he was pulling him close, holding on--God, he was so warm and so solid, Flavian couldn’t believe he’d been denying himself this. “Mordecai,” he said. “I’ve been such an idiot; I’m sorry--”

“No,” said Mordecai, and he pushed Flavian away, gently but firmly. “No, you were right. I should have seen--I should have known it wasn’t just a bit of fun for you.”

“My fault as much as yours. More,” said Flavian. “You never asked me to love you.”

“But I’m glad you did.” Mordecai laughed; there was a bitter edge to it that Flavian had never heard before. “Have you ever heard anything so disgustingly selfish?”

Flavian was itching to touch Mordecai again. He gripped the back of a chair instead. “It isn’t. It’s better . . . at least you valued it, even if you couldn’t return it. I’d rather that than what I thought, that you just didn’t care. Mordecai--can’t we try again? I wouldn’t make any demands on you, I promise, I’ve missed you so much. And you’re _not_ selfish, don’t say it. You can be a bit thoughtless, maybe, but you’re kind and generous and brave and . . . you’re good underneath. All the way through.”

Mordecai sat down on the chair, leaned his head back to look up at Flavian. “Do you think so?”

“I know it.”

“I’m leaving the castle,” said Mordecai. He looked down at his hands so that Flavian couldn’t see his face anymore, only his curls, pale and springy. “I’m moving to London.”

“Why?” Flavian nearly wailed. “Is it because of Rosalie? Is it--it’s not because of me?”

“Nothing like that,” said Mordecai. “It’s just--I’ve made some contacts in the Wraith organization, and I think--Gabriel thinks--I may be able to infiltrate them, finally work out how they operate and who’s in charge. Bring them down once and for all.”

“No.” Flavian took Mordecai’s hand, and he didn’t pull away. “You can’t, one wrong step and they’ll kill you--”

“I’m hard to kill. I’m sorry to worry you, Flavian. But I’m the only man for the job.”

“I--” Flavian couldn’t really argue with that. He only said, in a small voice, “Be careful. Please?” And he kept a tight hold on Mordecai’s hand, as if he could keep Mordecai’s wandering spirit that way, tethered safe at home.

By the way Mordecai gripped back, maybe he was wishing the same thing.


End file.
